He Who Laughs Last
by Joodiff
Summary: In which Eve and Grace are presented with an unexpected opportunity to enjoy a good laugh at poor Boyd's expense... Complete. T-rated for strong language. Enjoy!


**DISCLAIMER:** I own nothing.

 _ **A/N:** This one's for Got Tea. She knows why. ;)_

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 **He Who Laughs Last**

by Joodiff

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"So what you're actually telling me," Boyd says, and Eve does not miss the dangerous, uncharacteristic softness of his tone, "is that we're comprehensively screwed on the forensics front."

It's not intended to be a question, she's sure. There's something rather more than unsettling about his unnatural level of restraint, and she risks a quick sideways glance at Grace, half looking for some kind of support. None is forthcoming, but Eve thinks she detects a flicker of wry sympathy in the clear blue eyes that gaze back at her with an enviable amount of quiet serenity. If, as seems likely, all hell is about to break loose, it's obvious that Grace, who is apparently almost completely immune to the vagaries of Boyd's uncertain temper, won't lose any sleep over it. Clearing her throat, Eve replies, "What I'm telling you is that the level of contamination – "

"Fuck," he says, cutting across her careful words. "Fuck, fuck, _fuck_."

It's not personal, she knows that, and she understands his bitter frustration. Three men are dead – and have been so for more than eight years – and though the chances of Ian Haig not being as guilty as bloody sin of their murder are so infinitesimal that they might as well not exist, the forensic evidence that would almost certainly have ensured a quick, clean conviction is… Well, not too put too fine a point on it, is lying in ruins in a sopping wet, oily mess on the stainless steel examination table in front of them.

She's about to speak again, but Boyd beats her to it with, "Scrawny little bastard knew exactly what he was doing when he jumped into that damned inspection pit, didn't he?"

"No doubt about it," Eve agrees, having seen the crime scene photographs of the abandoned garage and the derelict, half-flooded brick-lined inspection pit with its unappealing, rainbow-hued surface. The clear visual evidence of years and years of accumulated oil and petrol and diesel. She sighs. "I mean, it's possible – _theoretically_ possible – that with enough time and effort, I could get something usable from his clothes, but personally I wouldn't put money on it."

"We still have Thompson's statement," Grace points out.

"Which would carry a damn sight more weight with a jury if he hadn't been a fucking rent boy at the time," Boyd growls at her. "And don't give me that bloody look, I'm not making a moral judgement, I'm just telling it how it is."

"How possible is 'theoretically possible'?" Grace asks after a short, strained silence.

Eve shrugs. "Literally that – _theoretically_ possible. As in not completely _im_ possible in _all_ circumstances. But in my extensive experience – "

"What about the garage itself?" Boyd interrupts. "Locard's exchange principle, and all that?"

"Do you _know_ how much cross-contamination we're talking about?" It's a rhetorical question. Eve's well aware that he does, that he is, in fact, clutching at straws. But his words echo in her mind, reminding her of the basic principles drummed into her time and time again during every course and seminar related to the processing of evidence that she's ever attended. Locard's exchange principle – every contact leaves a trace. Suppressing growing excitement, she says, "You and Spencer chased him down the alley behind the garage and the workshop, didn't you?"

Frowning, Boyd nods. "We did, yeah. Spence went over the fence after him, but the little bastard doubled back somehow."

"And _you_ tackled him just before he ducked into the garage?"

"Yeah." Short, brusque. Eve knows why.

Grace's voice and expression are both deadpan as she says, "But he managed to get away from you."

Boyd's frown becomes a dark, forbidding glare. "Oh, go on, get it over with."

"What?" Grace asks, the impression of wide-eyed innocence so perfect that even Eve – who already knows exactly what happened – is almost fooled. It's difficult to restrain her smirk, but she manages it. Just.

"You know _what_ ," he accuses. "Fucker elbowed me straight in the nuts. As I'm sure _both_ the junior officers in attendance took great delight in informing you."

"Repeatedly," Eve murmurs, and has to turn away to hide her amusement.

"Go on," he growls, "have a good laugh at my expense. Get it out of your systems, the pair of you. I'm glad you find it so bloody funny."

"Poor Boyd," Grace soothes, her tone solicitous. "Eve's a qualified medical doctor, perhaps she should…?"

It's the final straw. It's a struggle to make the laughter that breaks from her sound like a sudden unexpected coughing fit, but Eve does her best. She's certain she can feel Boyd's implacable dark gaze burning into the back of her skull. When she's sure she can maintain the level of professionalism required, she turns back and asks, "But you did grab him and grapple with him?"

The answer is an immediate and testy, "Yes."

"Eve?" Grace questions.

Pointing at Boyd, she instructs, "Stay there. Don't move an inch."

He looks perplexed. "What? Why?"

She's already in motion, heading towards the storage cupboards under the benches at the rear of the lab. Over her shoulder, she says, "Because you're right – Locard's exchange principle."

"Of _course_. Boyd grappled him _before_ he jumped into the inspection pit," Grace says. To their colleague, she adds, "She's right – stand absolutely still."

Beneath several boxes of surgical gloves, Eve finds what she's looking for – a small pile of individually sealed plastic sheets. Useful for all manner of things at crime scenes, she's discovered over the years. Pulling on a fresh pair of surgical gloves, she extracts one of the packs and tears it open. Walking back to her colleagues, she instructs, "Stand on this, Boyd."

"Why?"

"Do you want me to explore every possible avenue, or not?"

"Well, of course I bloody do."

Opening out the sheet, a square roughly eight foot square of transparent plastic, and laying it out on the lab floor next to Boyd, she says, "Step onto the sheet."

He does as he's told, but asks, "And then…?"

From the narrow-eyed look he's giving her, one filled with deep suspicion, Eve thinks he's got a pretty good idea of what's coming next. Striving to maintain her hard-won professional calm, she says, "Take off your lab coat and jacket."

Boyd scowls at her. "Eve…"

"Look," she says, "the very last thing Haig had close contact with before he jumped into the pit was _you_. It's just possible that something useful could have transferred during the struggle, and that it hasn't yet been lost or contaminated. Do you want to find out, or do you want to – "

"Oh, fine," he grumbles, cutting her short. He steps onto the sheet, unbuttons his white lab coat, takes it off and drops it down onto the plastic square. His grey suit jacket follows. Hands on hips and still glowering, he adds, "I want my phone, my wallet, and my warrant card back."

"As soon as possible," Eve promises him. Deliberately looking down at the sheet so she doesn't have to hold his irate gaze, she says, "Shoes, socks, and trousers, please."

"You're fucking kidding me, right?" he protests, looking from her to Grace and back. He shakes his head. "I am _not_ stripping in front of you two."

"Well, you can't leave the lab. It's vitally important to maintain the integrity of any potential evidence, remember?" Grace says, though to Eve her voice sounds thin and a fraction higher than normal, as if she, too, is fighting hard not to laugh.

"Piss off, Grace. Whose bloody side are you on?"

Daring to look up, Eve delivers the _coup de grâce_. "And your shirt."

Boyd's reply is succinct. "Fuck that."

"I'll get you a disposable forensic suit to wear," she cajoles. "Come on, Boyd. Now is not the time to be bashful. We'll turn our backs if you like."

"Will we?" Grace says, and hastily amends her words to, "We will."

"You're both enjoying this far too much for my liking," he pronounces, making no move to divest himself of any further items of clothing.

"Nonsense," Grace chides. "We're simply happy that there's still a faint chance of obtaining some useful forensics, aren't we, Eve?"

"We are," she confirms, nodding. Wondering which of them is going to start laughing first, she adds a lofty, "We're both consummate professionals, and our minds are entirely on the case."

"Of _course_ they are," Boyd retorts. "Not for one _moment_ do I think either of you are making the most of an unexpected opportunity to humiliate me."

"'Humiliate' is a strong word," Grace tells him. "Oh, for heaven's sake, Boyd, just take your damn clothes off will you?"

"Well, ordinarily I'd be flattered, Grace, but…"

"Um," Eve says, wondering if it's actually possible to die from enforced laughter suppression, "if you two would like to be alone for a bit, just say the word – _after_ I've got his clothes."

Frosty does not begin to describe the look Grace gives her. She smirks back, enjoying herself immensely. In her opinion it's long past time that the two of them stopped skirting around each other and did something about the palpable sexual tension that crackles between them at the strangest moments. What's stopping them, she's not exactly sure, but she suspects it has quite a lot to do with ingrained notions of professional etiquette and integrity. Folding her arms, she looks from one to the other, eyebrows raised.

"Oh, fine," Boyd growls, apparently losing all patience with the situation. He reaches up and starts to unfasten his shirt buttons, every movement sharp and antagonistic. Clearly, Eve thinks, he has no future as a striptease artist. He briefly stops unbuttoning to fiddle with his cufflinks, then returns to the task, pulling his shirt free from the waist of his suit trousers and finally stripping it off completely. It joins the jacket and lab coat on the plastic sheet, and then, bare-chested, he glowers at them, as if daring either of them to say a single word.

There's no way Eve can let such a tempting opportunity to tease him pass. Straight-faced, she says, "Nice deltoids."

Actually, she muses as he scowls at her, they are. Definitely a grudging admission. He's certainly not a young man, and he hasn't got the chiselled physique of a gym rat, past or present, but his shoulders are broad, his chest is deep and smooth and –

A sudden coughing fit to her left interrupts her idle perusal. Grace. It sounds every bit as artificial as the one Eve was forced to contrive earlier. Though the reasons may be somewhat different.

"Glass of water?" she offers, not surprised when the answer is just a sharp glare. Incredibly fond of the older woman as she is, she's not above teasing _her_ , either. Returning her attention to Boyd, she says, "Shoes and socks?"

He gives her a long, measured look that suggests he won't forget, let alone forgive, this incident for a long, long time. If ever. Then he crouches to untie his shoelaces, providing both of them with an even better view of his wide, powerful shoulders. Eve is tempted to reassure Grace that she can provide CPR if necessary, but the forbidding look she gets when she glances at her makes her think better of the idea. Boyd, with his notoriously quick temper, is formidable, but Grace… Grace is just as fierce when provoked, and twice as likely to inflict lasting damage with her sharp tongue.

"Happy now?" a barefooted Boyd inquires, straightening up again.

"Trousers," Eve says, smirking inwardly at the audible – if hurriedly muffled – choking noise from beside her. She knows she'll pay for it, maybe now, maybe later, but she adds, "Are you _sure_ you don't need a glass of water or something, Grace?"

If looks could kill…

Boyd snaps his fingers repeatedly, jerking her full attention back to him. "When you've quite finished…"

"Trousers," she repeats, not cowed by the censure in his tone.

"Disposable suit," he counters.

Nodding, Eve moves towards the appropriate storage cupboard. "Size?"

"Large, extremely pissed off Detective Superintendent-sized," he snaps, clearly not finding the situation half as funny as she is.

"Extra-large," she decides aloud, searching through the stack of sealed, lightweight protective suits. Finding the right size, she goes back to stand beside Grace, noting that the other woman's expression is fixed somewhere between unworthy amusement and appalled fascination. Sheer devilment makes Eve say, "We'll spare your blushes and turn round if you're really _that_ shy, Boyd."

As expected, it's a red rag to the proverbial bull. Grace isn't the only one who knows a bit about psychology. Boyd glowers, plainly recognising the tacit challenge, and sets his jaw. He looks stubborn and sulky, and the impulse to laugh returns in full force. It takes a huge effort of will to keep it under control. Not saying a single word and staring straight at her, he reaches down and unbuckles his belt. The urge to give him a smug smile in response dies away the moment he says in a conversational tone, "You're quite sure you want me to do this, are you?"

A worrying and somewhat traumatic thought crosses Eve's mind. The dark eyes give nothing away, no hint as to whether he's attempting to call her – _their_ – bluff. As he reaches for the button on his trousers, she lifts a hand. "Wait. Please tell me that you didn't choose today of all days to go commando? You have got something on under there, right?"

"I thought you were, how did Grace put it?" he frowns, making a great show of thinking about it. "Oh, yes: 'a qualified medical doctor'. Yeah, that was it. Unshockable? Seen it all before? That kind of thing?"

"Not funny, Boyd," Eve admonishes him. It's astonishing just how fast a situation can go from being unintentionally hilarious to –

"He's bluffing," Grace says, suddenly sounding much steadier than she feels.

Eve glances sideways at her. "You think?"

"I know," the older woman confirms with an emphatic nod. "Trust me."

"Your call," Boyd advises, "but I thought we were all entirely focused on the case and any potential forensic evidence? I could be covered head to foot in fibres from – "

"He's bluffing," Grace repeats. "It's written all over his face."

True, one dark eyebrow is quirked at them, but otherwise, to Eve, at least, he looks infuriatingly inscrutable. And what's the big deal, anyway? She is, as has been twice pointed out, a doctor, and the whole thing has to be far more embarrassing for Boyd than for either of them. Hasn't it?

"Trousers," she instructs for the third time, waving the packet containing the disposable suit at him. "Drop 'em."

Boyd shrugs, the movement causing the muscles in his shoulders to flex. "It was worth a try."

He releases the button, starts to unzip. And to Eve's huge relief, the very first thing exposed is a plain black elasticated waistband. Trunks, she assumes. Good. The zip continues to descend.

"Dear God," Grace says, which is fairly close to what Eve suddenly finds herself thinking.

As the trousers fall, the trunks beneath are revealed in all their glory. Black, yes, but only the waistband and the background colour. The rest is… well, quite frankly, the rest is rather like the horrific embodiment of a very bad migraine she once had. Zig-zag stripes in a shocking bright pink, a lurid neon green and a close-to-fluorescent orange.

"Bloody hell," she exclaims, the words forced from her without a single thought. It's too damn much, it really is. She snorts with the effort of holding her laughter back, then surrenders to the inevitable. Unable to stop laughing, she looks at Grace, and that only makes the situation so much worse. Her wide-eyed colleague is staring, transfixed, at the nightmarish apparition before them, and Eve can't decide if her expression is one of pure horror or of… something else entirely.

It might not just be those horrendous mismatched stripes that Grace is staring at, she realises. Or, in fact, at all. Not given the enhanced… masculine profile… created by the trunks in question. Everything within being rather… gathered up and well-presented.

Scowling again, Boyd puts his hands on his hips. It really doesn't help.

"Oh dear," Eve manages between breathless gasps of laughter. She's certain that any moment her mascara is going to start running, she's so close to spilling hysterical tears. "Present from a colour-blind admirer, perhaps?"

"Piss off," he tells her. "Clean underwear is at a bloody premium when you live on your own and you work every sodding hour God sends. Be thankful there was anything in the drawer at all when I got dressed this morning."

"Oh, I _am_ ," she assures him, still chortling. "I really, really am."

His forbidding gaze moves to Grace. "Well? Go on, Foley… join in the bloody cackling. I can take it."

"Grace?" Eve says, very much enjoying herself again. "Speak to us, Grace."

"Hideous," is the faint, barely audible response.

"Oh, come on," Eve says, nudging her with a sharp elbow, "I've seen men in _far_ worse physical condition."

"I think you'll find," Boyd says, with crushing dignity, "that she's referring to my underwear."

Eve smirks at him. "Of course she is. Silly me."

"Suit," he demands, stepping forward off the plastic sheet and holding out his hand for the packet.

Dutifully handing it over, Eve makes a vain attempt at professionalism with, "You should be able to collect all this by the end of the day. I'll – "

"Yes, you will," Boyd interrupts, tearing into the plastic and extracting the coverall from within. "And I am _not_ going to be a happy man if you eventually end up telling me you found absolutely _nothing_ of any use. Do I make myself clear?"

"Crystal clear," she agrees, as he starts to struggle into the suit. A strong, deeply-ingrained sense of self-preservation stops her from offering to help. She looks at Grace, who's still staring fixedly at the empty spot previously occupied by Boyd. It's impossible to tell what thoughts are going through her mind, but Eve thinks she could take a fairly good guess. And most of them aren't about vivid stripes, she's sure.

"If _any_ of this ever gets further than the three of us and this lab," Boyd says, zipping up the white suit, "I will personally see to it that – "

He's interrupted by a sudden and very delayed peal of laughter from Eve's left. Grace, suddenly all-but incoherent with mirth. It's infectious. Eve starts to chuckle again, unable to stop herself.

The glare directed at them both is awe-inspiring in its bad-tempered intensity. It does nothing to calm either of them, however. Shaking with laughter, Eve reaches out to the workbench beside her, needing to physically steady herself.

"So bloody immature," he growls at them, "the pair of you. Go on, enjoy it while you can, but remember something…"

"What?" Eve wheezes, clutching at Grace with her free hand.

Even barefooted Boyd is impressively tall when he draws himself up to his full height. He looks down at the pair of them, his glare still inimical. "He who laughs last, laughs longest."

It's definitely a threat. But neither of them are in any state to be intimidated by it.

 _\- the end -_


End file.
